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		Kilroy-Silk bows out Thursday, 7th May 2009 Today, nominations closed for euro-candidates in the East Midlands euro election (taking place on June 4th), and as widely expected Robert Kilroy-Silk MEP was not on the list. Kilroy-Silk, TV personality, former talk-show host and former Labour MP, was the celebrity candidate for UKIP in the East Midlands in the 2004 euro-elections. With his improbable orange tan and his status as a former day-time TV star, he made a big impact, taking UKIP's share of the vote in the region to an exceptional 25%. However he soon fell out with his UKIP colleagues after failing in his bid for leadership of the party. He attempted to form his own break-away party "Veritas", but when that sank without trace he seemed to lose interest in his MEP job (while still claiming salary and expenses). UKIP, who scored a high-water-mark success in 2004 with twelve MEPs elected, have had a bad run since. Four of their twelve MEPs (including Kilroy) have left the party or been expelled; one went to jail for fraud while another is under investigation over his staff allowances. Kilroy relocated to Spain, and seems not to have visited the East Midlands for years. A couple of years back Conservative MEP Chris Heaton-Harris offered a prize of a bottle of champagne for a confirmed sighting of Kilroy in the region: it was never claimed. He also became a very occasional visitor to the parliament. When he did attend, he very rarely went to committee meetings, and he had a habit of generally abstaining in most of the votes. Very occasionally he would come out of hibernation and table hundreds of "Written Questions" to the Commission, often on eccentric topics. He hit the headlines when he complained, bizarrely, that Marks and Spencer's had distorting mirrors in their changing rooms to make customers look slimmer. Kilroy's decision not to stand comes as no surprise to politics-watchers in the region: given his behaviour over the last five years, and his reluctance to do the job, no party would have backed him, and his chances of success as an independent were rated very low. Commenting on Kilroy's departure, East Midlands Conservative MEP Roger Helmer said "Kilroy is no loss to the region -- he wasn't doing his job. I hope that all the five MEPs elected in June will work hard for East Midlands voters. Kilroy went out to lunch some years ago and never really came back".